Employment Discrimination

Willenson Law will represent employees who have been subjected to discrimination, wage theft and other unfair treatment in the workplace, on both an individual and class action basis. The firm accepts cases involving the following:

Wage and Hour violations

Discrimination on the basis of race, sex, ethnicity, religion and sexual orientation

Retaliation for having engaged in “protected” workplace activity

Discrimination and retaliation based on “association” (for example, where a white employee is fired for objecting to discrimination against black employees, or vice versa)

Sexual harassment; and violations of other state and federal employment statutes, such as the Family and Medical Leave Act and Illinois’ wage payment laws. We will represent private sector and public sector employees.

During her career, Marni Willenson has represented thousands of individuals who have sued their employers to end discrimination and for the recovery of unpaid wages. She and secured millions of dollars in back wages and other damages in employment class actions filed in federal courts across the nation.

She has represented individuals in industries as diverse as health care, public safety, federal sector, farmwork, landscaping, marketing, and general labor. She has litigated claims under the federal Fair Labor Standards Act, state wage and hour statutes, Title VII of the Civil Rights Act, Section 1983 (a federal statute which protects individuals from violations of their civil and constitutional rights), and numerous other federal and state laws.

Her cases have included the following:

Rosiles-Perez v. Superior Forestry Service, Inc. (M.D. Tennessee), where she served as lead counsel for three thousand forestry workers with wage claims under the Fair Labor Standards Act and the Migrant and Seasonal Agricultural Worker Protection Act.

Hernandez v. Kovacevich “5” Farms, Inc. (E.D. California), where she served as lead counsel for several hundred farmworkers with wage claims under both federal and state (California) wage and hour statutes.

Ms. Willenson has also performed significant work on numerous employment discrimination class action and “mass action” cases.